Comments on: Guardian 24,635 (Sat 28 Feb)/Enigmatist – Elbow greasehttp://www.fifteensquared.net/2009/03/07/guardian-24635-sat-28-febenigmatist-elbow-grease/
Never knowingly undersolved.Tue, 31 Mar 2015 21:30:24 +0000hourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=4.1.1By: Ralph Ghttp://www.fifteensquared.net/2009/03/07/guardian-24635-sat-28-febenigmatist-elbow-grease/#comment-73087
Mon, 09 Mar 2009 15:55:10 +0000http://fifteensquared.net/?p=6146#comment-730872d OLLA would be known to people who ‘eat local’ on the Costas, from the charmingly named ‘olla-podrida’. Seemingly not otherwise.
10d ODEA- nice homophone. Why ‘Roman’ I wondered. My impression is that in _Roman_ sites the odeum is usually a small auditorium et sim, whereas the Greek odeon/odeion can be more theatrical in scale.
21d I don’t like ‘erstwhile old-time’ for ‘remove ‘ot’.
At 21d, I think it reads OK as ‘In the money’ [definition]/ he’s one wanting > ‘yearner’/to deposit Yen [drop Y).
Overall, inclined to agree with Paul (11 above). Perimeter message a saving grace possibly.
]]>By: Paul (not Paul)http://www.fifteensquared.net/2009/03/07/guardian-24635-sat-28-febenigmatist-elbow-grease/#comment-73018
Mon, 09 Mar 2009 13:20:47 +0000http://fifteensquared.net/?p=6146#comment-73018The clues may be “fair” but I didn’t get much fun. This was just hard work. Too many obscure references to abbreviations and shorthands that are only learnt through and used in crosswords. I find enigmatist’s style too convaluted to be really enjoyable.
]]>By: rightbackhttp://www.fifteensquared.net/2009/03/07/guardian-24635-sat-28-febenigmatist-elbow-grease/#comment-72770
Sat, 07 Mar 2009 13:14:28 +0000http://fifteensquared.net/?p=6146#comment-72770Duggie, re 24dn: Documents on female sponger (4) = BUMF

There’s an implied comma here after ‘female’, i.e. the cryptic part is ‘on female, sponger’ leading to ‘on F, BUM’, analogous to ‘on the table, a teapot’. Quite devious but probably fair.

]]>By: rightbackhttp://www.fifteensquared.net/2009/03/07/guardian-24635-sat-28-febenigmatist-elbow-grease/#comment-72769
Sat, 07 Mar 2009 13:11:38 +0000http://fifteensquared.net/?p=6146#comment-727694dn: No, just an omission on my behalf – sorry, I should have explained this one. The clue is:

Here KHANATE (‘Region for Asian prince’) is hidden in ‘gymkhana – televised’, but the clue (prior to the question mark) suggests that it should be the other way round (because ‘X to hold Y’ would usually indicate that the answer is a word for Y and is hidden in the letters of X). Hence ‘Contrariwise’, to show that the hidden indicator actually works the other way round in this clue.

This device is used occasionally when the surface reading of the clue (i.e. what it would mean if it were not a cryptic crossword clue) lends itself to using a ‘hidden’ indicator but with the definition part (in this case ‘Region for Asian prince’) doing the holding, whereas for the cryptic reading it needs to be the other part (here ‘gymkhana – televised’).

]]>By: Duggiehttp://www.fifteensquared.net/2009/03/07/guardian-24635-sat-28-febenigmatist-elbow-grease/#comment-72768
Sat, 07 Mar 2009 13:05:12 +0000http://fifteensquared.net/?p=6146#comment-72768Barbara: re Khanate clue. I think it’s telling you that the hidden letters are not ‘held’ by the Asian prince. I wondered about the sequence of words in 24D.
]]>By: Barbarahttp://www.fifteensquared.net/2009/03/07/guardian-24635-sat-28-febenigmatist-elbow-grease/#comment-72765
Sat, 07 Mar 2009 12:53:55 +0000http://fifteensquared.net/?p=6146#comment-72765Re Khanate: 4dn
You didn’t mention that this was a hidden word, or was that too obvious?
Also, what was the function of “Contrariwise” ?
]]>By: Roger Murrayhttp://www.fifteensquared.net/2009/03/07/guardian-24635-sat-28-febenigmatist-elbow-grease/#comment-72762
Sat, 07 Mar 2009 12:36:28 +0000http://fifteensquared.net/?p=6146#comment-72762Thank God everyone found this hard, got about three quarters of it done at the weekend and meant to bash on with it during the week but never got round to it. Enigmatist is still my nemesis. Good week other than that, only missed one clue all week(in Rufus of all setters!) Thanks to all on this site for the help.
]]>By: rightbackhttp://www.fifteensquared.net/2009/03/07/guardian-24635-sat-28-febenigmatist-elbow-grease/#comment-72760
Sat, 07 Mar 2009 12:19:13 +0000http://fifteensquared.net/?p=6146#comment-72760Thanks eimi – I’m afraid I haven’t been keeping up with the recent exchanges. I saw Elbow as an undergrad but haven’t really kept up with them either; probably time to do something about that.

Mr Beaver – I’ll raise my hand for OLLA, but I’ve only ever seen it in barred puzzles like the Listener (usually in a clue for OLLAV, which is a learned ancient Irish man). It’s pretty obscure for a blocked puzzle, but I suppose this was a prize crossword so a bit of dictionary usage is to be expected.

]]>By: eimihttp://www.fifteensquared.net/2009/03/07/guardian-24635-sat-28-febenigmatist-elbow-grease/#comment-72751
Sat, 07 Mar 2009 11:29:30 +0000http://fifteensquared.net/?p=6146#comment-72751Hi Rightback. I started a brief discussion on the new Chat forum here recently after listening to the very same song. Shortly afterwards I went to see Elbow and they were unspeakably wonderful and finished their encores with Scattered Black and Whites.

(This may be off-message for the crossword, but it does relate to the blog.)

]]>By: Qaoshttp://www.fifteensquared.net/2009/03/07/guardian-24635-sat-28-febenigmatist-elbow-grease/#comment-72748
Sat, 07 Mar 2009 10:19:03 +0000http://fifteensquared.net/?p=6146#comment-72748Well, I thought this was the hardest Saturday crossword for a long time. And due in part to writing in SANDERS for 17ac. Since SANDERS was hidden in the clue (“They remove evidence of one-age exchange for ‘is and ‘ers”) and made so much sense for the solution that I never convinced myself it could be wrong!

After that, it was all downhill.

I do admire Enigmatist, but at the same time whenever I see his name on a Saturday, my first thought is that it’s time to take a week off :-).